[Dark Room]

Its dark in here.   Its always been dark in here. Its scary too.  Distressing.  I *need* to get out.  There's compulsions. I don't belong in this room.  Something is very wrong when I'm in the room.    I guess there used to be more light.  When I first realized I was stuck in a dark room, there were so many doors I could go through. Light shining through them into the room. That if I stepped through any of those doors, I could be free, until I stumbled into another dark room.  With voices and monster and anger and pain.

And I learned.  I learned how easy it was to get out of those rooms when I find myself in them.  I flitted from room to room.   I trained myself.  I knew where each of those doors were and could navigate the environment through muscle memory to reach each of the doors I knew were capable of helping me escape the fastest.  I was efficient. I was quick, and I took care of myself.

Until I learned that every door I went through hurt someone else.  It was something I slowly became aware of.  The door labeled "Passive aggression" was societal unacceptable. Going through that door was actually responsible for many of the other dark rooms I found myself in.   But I NEEDED to get out of this room I was in. I don't think I can explain the craving and compulsion driving me to escape.  Its like needing water.  Or air.   Its like running out of air and you KNOW if you can get out of the room you can have air again.  But finding out that you'll drown someone else in the process by climbing on top of them.  

Its like holding your hand to a burning stove, and knowing the only relief you'll get is if you replace your hand with someone elses hand. How do you battle "i don't want to hurt anyone" with "oh god please save me"

It took some time.  I've closed the passive aggressive door.  I turn off my router.  I lock myself in my house and turn my phone off.  I have to ask myself if going silent means I'm going through another door, "Manipulation"   So I curl up in my dark room and cry, because I don't know if any of these doors will help me.  Some people have a door called "Exercise" so I built it and it leads me to the same place I was already in.


Sometimes, if I sit long enough in the room, another door appears.  Its dim and in the distance and there's objects between me and it that i can't see.  And I trip over them, and if i'm calm enough, I can reach it.  But the problem is that the compulsion to get out is stronger than the idea of processing it.

I've learned new things.   Coloring my hair makes the dark room tolerable.  Running cold water on my feet, holding ice cubes.

Notes on my wrist.  Reminders that if I can sit long enough in the darkness that door will appear.  Or that I might not be in the dark room at all, it just looks like it.  And I can get out.

I've closed doors.  Spending money for instance.

Every door I close, the darker the room gets, and suddenly its not a test of which door do I pick, its "how long can I last in this dark room" how long do I fear the monsters of my most terrible fears.  Sometimes I'm calm in these rooms.   My body reacts in hyperventilating and anxiety ways. wails of the dead escaping from my mouth and I know what's happening and I've been there before, but I haven't moved towards those doors.   And that's a victory.  I'm building endurance.  

But there are more doors:
Harm.
Verbal Abuse
Masturbation
Sexual promiscuity

And doors that I've never tried: Alcohol.

The more I close the doors, the more confined I am, the less doors I have to feel safe from and the more explosive I'll rip through those doors.  Especially as I try and work for that dim dark door in the distance.   I lose the energy and I make a break for that door that I think will hurt the least.  

And then there is despair.  Mostly because I've worked for years trying to last in the darkness.

I'd like to think that each time I work towards that dim door, that it gets brighter.   But it looks the same every time. The I trip over different objects each time, and it doesn't seem to get easier to reach it.

I just want people to understand that when I step through these doors, I lost a battle with the darkness.  I lost a battle with myself.  I lost a battle with monsters and not only do I have to live with that knowledge, I have to live with whatever the consequences of using that damn door.